The Sleeping Car Porter

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When a mudslide strands a train, Baxter, a queer Black sleeping car porter, must contend with the perils of white passengers, ghosts, and his secret love affair

Baxters name isnt George. But its 1929, and Baxter is lucky enough, as a Black man, to have a job as a sleeping car porter on a train that crisscrosses the country. So when the passengers call him George, he has to just smile and nod and act invisible. What he really wants is to go to dentistry school, but hell have to save up a lot of nickel and dime tips to get there, so he puts up with 'George.'

On this particular trip out west, the passengers are more unruly than usual, especially when the train is stalled for two extra days; their secrets start to leak out and blur with the sleep-deprivation hallucinations Baxter is having. When he finds a naughty postcard of two queer men, Baxters memories and longings are reawakened; keeping it puts his job in peril, but he cant part with the postcard or his thoughts of Edwin Drew, Porter Instructor.

'Mayrs prose is vivid but never overwrought, capturing the surrealism of intense fatigue in constant motion Readers will be captivated.' Publishers Weekly, starred review

'In 1929, being a passenger train porter was fraught with challenges...Baxters own sleep deprivation is perhaps the most intriguing character of the book. It leads to hallucinations, questionable decisions, and borderline supernatural suggestions.' Kirkus Reviews

'Suzette Mayrs novelThe Sleeping Car Porteran artfully constructed story that moves, beguiles, and satisfies.' Brett Josef Grubisic,The Toronto Star

'Suzette Mayr brings to life believably, achingly, thrillingly a whole world contained in a passenger train moving across the Canadian vastness, nearly one hundred years ago. As only occurs in the finest historical novels, every page inThe Sleeping Car Porterfeels alive and immediate and eerily contemporary. The sleeping car porter in this sleek, stylish novel is named R.T. Baxter calledGeorgeby the people upon whom he waits, as is every other Black porter. Baxters dream of one day going to school to learn dentistry coexists with his secret life as a gay man, and in Mayrs triumphant novel we follow him not only from Montreal to Calgary, but into and out of the lives of an indelibly etched cast of supporting characters, and, finally, into a beautifully rendered radiance.' 2022 Scotiabank Giller Prize Jury

'Suzette MayrsThe Sleeping Car Porteroffers a richly detailed account of a particular occupation and time train porter on a Canadian passenger train in 1929 and unforcedly allows it to illuminate the societal strictures imposed on black men at the time and today. Baxter is a secretly-queer and sleep-deprived porter saving up for dental school, working a system that periodically assigns unexplained demerits, and once a certain threshold is reached, the porter loses his job. Thus, success is impossible, the best one can do is to fail slowly. As Baxter takes a cross-continental run, the boarding passengers have more secrets than an Agatha Christie cast, creating a powder keg on train tracks.The Sleeping Car Porteris an engaging and illuminating novel about the costs of work, service, and secrets.' Keith Mosman, Powell's Books

'I thoughtThe Sleeping Car Porterwas fantastic! It strikes a balance between being about the struggles of being black and gay at that time while not being too heavy handed with it. I enjoyed his constant mental math on how many demerits he might receive for each infraction. The reader really gets a sense of the conflict that Baxter is going through. I really liked reading a book from the perspective of a porter.' Hunter Gillum, Beaverdale Books

Reviews

Mayrs prose is vivid but never overwrought, capturing the surrealism of intense fatigue in constant motion Readers will be captivated. Publishers Weekly, starred review

"In 1929, being a passenger train porter was fraught with challenges...Baxters own sleep deprivation is perhaps the most intriguing character of the book. It leads to hallucinations, questionable decisions, and borderline supernatural suggestions." Kirkus Reviews

"Suzette Mayrs novelThe Sleeping Car Porteran artfully constructed story that moves, beguiles, and satisfies." Brett Josef Grubisic,The Toronto Star

"Suzette Mayr brings to life believably, achingly, thrillingly a whole world contained in a passenger train moving across the Canadian vastness, nearly one hundred years ago. As only occurs in the finest historical novels, every page inThe Sleeping Car Porterfeels alive and immediate and eerily contemporary. The sleeping car porter in this sleek, stylish novel is named R.T. Baxter calledGeorgeby the people upon whom he waits, as is every other Black porter. Baxters dream of one day going to school to learn dentistry coexists with his secret life as a gay man, and in Mayrs triumphant novel we follow him not only from Montreal to Calgary, but into and out of the lives of an indelibly etched cast of supporting characters, and, finally, into a beautifully rendered radiance." 2022 Scotiabank Giller Prize Jury

"Mayrs new novel, through painstaking historical research, reconstructs the workdays of a Black, lower-class, closeted gay man." Reinhold Kramer, The Winnipeg Free Press

"Baxter works the trains as they run from Toronto to Winnipeg, through Calgary and Banff to Vancouver. Passengers on board wrestle with the details of their lives: hats and weddings, books and paperwork, drinks and cigars, childhood loss and bad telegrams, boots to be shined, a scrutinized pocket watch, communication with the dead. Baxter continuously serves them, ever watchful, needing perfection. Ten more demerits will get him fired, and a black man hiding his desire for other men has plenty of reasons to fear being targeted by whites with money. Endless patience is required to be a sleeping car porter. He's always exhausted, but it's a job, and he's saving, determined to pay for school and become a dentist who will one day be important. Then he'll be the one riding. For now, his dreams keep him alive, and time spent with people shoved together in tight spaces can shake up whole worlds. In the end, it's a little girl who fully reveals him. Shes just lost her mother and won't sleep, clinging to Baxter instead. This is intensely researched historical fiction that doesnt feel like history. It feels like heart." Tim McCarthy, Boswell Book Company, Milwaukee, WI

"Mayr evokes the mystique of transcontinental travel and the tumult of lives on the margins in this much-anticipated period novel. All aboard!" Oprah Daily

I couldnt help imagining what a film Wes Anderson might make of Suzette Mayrs The Sleeping Car Porter. The novels main character is a gay Black porter riding the rails in 1920s Canada, coping with a horde of difficult long-haul passengers, including a child who appears to have permanently attached herself to his leg. Terrified that a breach of one of the railways insanely restrictive rules will get him fired before he can save enough money for dental school, he amuses himselfand keeps awake on his grueling shiftsby imagining the medical horrors that lie behind the smiles (or grimaces) of his clientele. The New York Times

Author Bio

Suzette Mayr is the author of the novels Dr. Edith Vane and the Hares of Crawley Hall, Monoceros, Moon Honey, The Widows, and Venous Hum. The Widows was shortlisted for the Commonwealth Writers' Prize for Best Book in the Canada-Caribbean region, and has been translated into German. Moon Honey was shortlisted for the Writers' Guild of Alberta's Best First Book and Best Novel Awards. Monoceros won the ReLit Award, the City of Calgary W. O. Mitchell Book Prize, was longlisted for the 2011 Giller Prize, and shortlisted for a Ferro-Grumley Award for LGBT Fiction, and the Georges Bugnet Award for Fiction. She and her partner live in a house in Calgary close to a park teeming with coyotes.